The birth of New York as the city of towers began in the 1890s. The images in this video capture views of New York before and during this transformation. In particular, we feature a panorama of the skyline as it would have been experienced by visitors to the observation floor in the dome of the Pulitzer, or World Building in 1892. Completed in 1890, the 309-foot tower was the world's tallest office building. The 360-degree view, which the Museum created as an animation from ten photographs published in the 1893 edition of King's Handbook of New York, retrieves a moment in the city's history before the proliferation of slender spires that would sprout along Broadway and Wall Street in the next several years.

The second panorama is the 1905 American Mutoscope film of the view from the new Times Tower. The film was recreated by The Library of Congress from a "paper positive" in its collection after the negative had deteriorated.